PaoloBillsFanFromItaly

Another interest thing, my hands back have become drier and drier and full of bruises and cuts. This was simply due to...frequent washes... I bought a cream in pharmacy and things are getting better, I did't know my skin was so delicate...

Covid attacks the throat, the bronchus, like the seasonal flu. In the worst case it attacks the pneumonia. No need to be worried about toilet paper shortage...

Unfortunately yesterday night many people from Milan area avoided controls and came to Southern Italy, where their parents live. They think they are safer to run from the "core" of the epidemy, but instead they are bringing the disease to their beloved ones. This is not good news. It's like in USA people from Seattle would come back to Oregon, Wyoming, Montana... No problem of toilet paper here Only italian one is slimmer than american one, in USA most of the stuff is bigger...

Yes stores are getting food without any problems, people understood this and they don't leave the stores empty like before. Elderly people are helped by their younger parents or by community associations, scouts, churches and so on.

Laws and rules must be followed in the whole national territory, without exceptions, but the health care emergency right now is only in Lombardia region. In Florence there is no emergency right now, but the infections for sure are destined to grow, the effects of the decree will begin to show the consequences in quite some time. My opinion is that Italy took the most dratic countermeasures in Europe, second only to South Korea and China in the world, at the moment I think that Italy can be safer than most countries.

I take the elevator to go to my office. The elevator is designed to carry 8 people, but in these days only two people are allowed. When people are in, they don’t talk, they don’t open their mouth, not even to say “Ciao”, and “Arrivederci”. Good manners are abandoned for the sake of the common good. Today a nurse measured our temperature and gave us protective masks. Here is my colleague working with the mask: On the way back I decided to take the train. I have two laptops with me and two copybooks full of notes and I don’t want to walk back home. I am confident that trains will be empty. At the station there is a police checkpoint, everybody must go through and answer policemen questions. I show my certificate and my Id card and they let me inside. As I supposed, the train is almost empty. Now I have to go up to my hill. I decide not to walk up the “creuza” like I usually do because of the luggage I am carrying and because it is heavy raining. I decide to take the bus, there is some people inside, I don’t feel totally safe. It’s cold and raining outside but I decide to open the bus windows. People understand and do not complain. I get home, I wash my hands, I change my clothes and I disinfect the cell phone. My mum texts me, she wants me at her home for dinner. Every day she invite me for dinner, my parents are 69 and 73 years old, I told her that I won’t come. We will meet again when this thing will be over. So folks, that’s it, I hope you appreciate this. Here there is no panic, only some anxiety and boredom, but I am sure that if everybody will do his thing, this pandemy will be over. And please be careful, I think that all parts of the world are facing the same adversity and should be headed toward the same direction!

Only a Pharmacy is open, its sign is blinking I take a picture of this little square, because it is always full of people, while today is totally empty. People waiting for the bus. Public transportation is not shut down, but it can be dangerous these days, wearing gloves and masks is strongly recommended. I arrive to my town main square, I just see one person, can you spot him? Post offices are open, like every service of public utility, but in every closed environment open to the public, only a few people at time is allowed. The others are wating outside, far from each other by at least one meter and a half. This security distance must be always respected, when two pedestrian cross their way, they must “maneuver” to keep the distance. When people has to cross the road at the zebras, the have the keep the distance too. Also tobacco shops are open, this caused some protests. Government earn a lot of money by tobacco selling due to taxes. Anyway, this shop is small so only one person is allowed inside, wait outside girl. I arrive in my building, the typical downtown skyscraper. At building entrance, a disinfectant dispenser has been installed. Wash your hands and don’t bring the virus in fellas!

Hi everybody, I decided to open this topic to give you a witness of the “ordinary” life in Italy under the “Stay at Home” legislative decree to fight the spread of Covid19. I just want to tell you about my day, with few words and photos. Because I can only attach one photo per post, the report will be split in several small sub posts. I kindly ask you not to reply until my final “subpost” is finished. Ok let’s start. Today is my last day at work in office. I work in a industrial automation company and from next Monday I will work from home. In all this week I decided to go to work on foot, in order to avoid public transportation. It is about a 40 minutes walk. I exit my apartment bringing with me a document that states where I live and where I work. People is allowed to move only to go to work, to buy food, or for strict necessities. Like many citizens of Genoa my neighbourhood is upon a hill, in order to go to downtown I take a “creuza”, the typical pedestrian red bricked street from my city. There are a lot this old and steep narrow paths in my town. Usually I met several people going to downtown like me, but today I literally met no one… Oh well, I lied, I met someone…meoooowwww… Now I am in Via Balbi, this is the core of the humanistic university center in Genoa. Law school, history, literature, politics are here, and usually this street is crowded with students. Schools have been closed since last week of february, all bars, restaurants are closed by the decree.

Oh yes, in my city too folks

https://www.standard.co.uk/showbiz/celebrity-news/embarrassing-bodies-dr-christian-jessen-coronavirus-italy-siesta-comment-a4386371.html The most stupid thing is all of that is that "siesta" is a spanish word.

Spain, Champions League match played at "closed doors": Valencia supporters: Triple facepalm...

I agree with these points. But the post is missing the main point. The virus is spread worldwide and everybody has to address the problem.

I know all of this stuff, and you are right being confused because the thing is not so linear. When first news of coronavirus arrived in Italy the chinese community was treated like pestilence spreaders. Chinese kids were asked to get out public buses for example, and no one entered in chinese restaurants. By the way, I have a close friend engaged with a chinese girl, they own a chinese restaurant and they were forced to close (like many others) and I don't know if they will open again. These demostrations you posted refer to that period, and beware, because it is very important, this period was BEFORE the 25th of January, aka the Chinese New Years Eve. So the italian-chinese community was neglected just because "the shape of their eyes", most of them are born in Italy or they did not visit their homecountry for years! Then the 25th of January came, Italy at first decided for a forced quarantine of chinese coming back from New Year Eve, Chinese premier complained (because of business, of course), Italy changed its mind to "voluntary quarantine". This episode changed everything because now the italian-chinese were the first to be scared to death, because they knew what was happening in their homecountry, while Italians underrated the issue. I repeat, I don't exclude that chinese returning from New Year Eve was a factor, I say that was a concurring factor and certainly it was not THE factor. And I want to be clear, chinese people begun to behave in a way that we are FORCED to behave now, way before Italians, because the knew what was coming. So they self isolated, wear masks, and so on., and I repeat, we mocked and used to have fun of them After this the media and politicians declarations were up and down. After the first cases there was THE TERROR. People begun not to go spend money, so, ok, this is JUST A FLU, for the sake of economy! People went on with their life like it was nothing. Of course everybody is confused, media and politicians handled the thing in the worst case possible! Until the hospitals begun to be full of people attached to machines. Now we are under laws that limit our freedom. But I think that government took the right decision, I don't want my parents to die. And italians are behaving in a good way and collaborating.

Ok, but what about the thousands of european and americans that travelled to wuhan in the period of co-vid incubation? Then again, if a chinese has got some flu he could have stayed home and nobody would have noticed. But if this chinese had serious symptoms he HAD to go to hospitals to be treated. And I repeat, not a single chinese tested positive. And again, chinese communities are spread all over the world, why Italy and not France, or Germany ? Because of the textile factory in Prato ? But the big problem occurred in another region... And again, does it matter now ?

Wait, I don't discount the possibility that a Chinese brought the disease in Italy. This unknown, or theese unknown chinese guys coming back from China could have infected someone, but that episodes probably remained confined within the chinese community and they did not spread up. On the other side, a 38 years old italian guy went to a hospital with the virus and spread it in the hospital causing a big disease hotbed. This is well documented, also the personnel in that hospital is under investigation and also the regional governement of Lombardia is under investigation because they are charged not be apply the correct health care protocols. These are facts.

Also in Italy the mob assaulted the supermarkets two weeks ago. This is very stupid because goods don't go out of order and massing people rise up in a significative way the probability of infection. Now in every shop that are allowed to be open, like pharmacies and grocery shops only a few people are let to get in, the others are waiting outside, in a queue but far one from each other. Yesterday I waited 15 minutes to go to the supermarket, but there was no any shortage of anything.

This could better than nothing, but it is dangerous. Here in Italy a person who has symptoms call from home and specialists visit him in order to perform the test. A suspected case travelling around is a good way to spread the virus. Be careful folks.

That tweet says things appearing to be obvious, but let me tell me something. 1) First of all, chinese community in Italy in 300.000 units, the fact that one third of chinese people was away from Italy for the new year eve is way exagerrated. 2) Chinese community was very aware of the problem, WAY MORE THAN ITALIANS. For the sake of not spreading the covid into their own community they put themselves in quarantine. I have a close friend who is engaged to a chinese girl, I have direct information of the chinese community of my city. And we called them crazy, we used to make fun of them, their masks and their paranoia. 3) In Italy there are 12463 confirmed cases of covid, with 827 deaths. Do you know how many chinese people are among them? The answer is TWO, and they are not italian-chinese residents, they were two tourists that were confirmed in Rome before the famous italian PATIENT ONE. No other chinese was tested positive, no other chinese was attacched to an artificial respirator. How do you explain that? 4) We live in a globalized world, LOT and LOT of people traveled from Hubei to Europe (and to the US) in the days when the disease was INCUBATING. People from Italy, France, UK, Spain, Germany travelled from Hubei and back. For sure way more that 100.000. For most of the infected people the disease is just a normal flu, and people spread the disease silently until a serious case (the infamous PATIENT ONE) was found. 5) A lot of speculation was made in Italy about the PATIENT ZERO. How the PATIENT ONE got infected, he may have been infected in a chinese "massage" center...maybe during the "happy ending" handjob? Listen, almost all Italian thought about this, but this just crap you say to have some laughs with friends. According to some sources, the person who brought the disease to Europe is a german guy. So now, do you still think that this tweet was so "obvious" ?

This is so false. Textile factories in Italy where lots of chinese people works in are located in Prato province, in Tuscany region, and listen, no chinese person in the area is positive to the virus. It is possible that allowing chinese people back to Italy after the Chinese New Years Eve was a mistake, but it is not the main reason of the disease spread in Italy. By the way, Italy was the first in Europe to block direct flight from China, but other European countries did not apply any block, so lot of people came back from China to Italy via Amsterdam, for example. Italy made two big errors and they are well known: - Hospitals were not ready for the disease, so when the Patient One (we call him so) came to the hospital, covid was NOT diagnosed. In the meantime he spread the disease IN the hospital and lots of doctors and nurses got infected and they spread the disease to lots of patients. - The Patient One was well identified, but the Patient Zero (the first that brought the disease in Italy) was NEVER found. It was supposed to be a chinese business man who the Patient One had a meeting with but all the testing were negative. In the meantime, the real Patient Zero spread the disease in other parts of Italy and the disease got out of control in a few weeks. South Korea, for example, succed to keep track of all the chains and subchains of infection and kept the thing under control. All countries in Europe are in the same situation of Italy 9 days ago. I don't know the situation in the US but I fear that the same will happen.

It is written by an american doctor working in Rome. I think it is worth a read: https://www.thelocal.it/20200306/coronavirus-italy-is-notorious-for-disorganization-but-this-time-its-bested-the-us?fbclid=IwAR0tcaUA1c4qzH0YGf4Ptb0kvqMsdYhFmNlD8iCCL8x3N-XZUEWviue0k9g

From what I read here it seems that republicans believed what Trump said: Covid is not a problem in the USA, it is only a problem in Europe due to European mismanagent, so the solution is just to shut down flights from Europe. Who says that the government is wrong is addressed as "democrat", and his/her criticism is considered a free attack to the President and not based on scientific evidence. Let me say something, in Italy was the opposite, because the "left" wing is in charge. So the right wing was asking stronger measures and the "left wing party" was addressing them as people who want to make free criticism to the government and exploit the situation to rise their status among the citizens. Now the reality is that who is in charge does not want to stop a country, does not want stop the economy, people in charge don't want to take unpopular decisions for something "little more than a flu". They prefer to say that the covid is a problem "elsewhere", in Italy we said that the problem was only in China, Germany is saying that the problem is only in Italy, USA is saying that the problem is only in Europe. Until the hospitals will begin to be full of people that need machines to be able to breath. It happened in China, it is happening here in Italy, it will happen in France, Germany, and USA. And forgive my english, sometimes is not so easy writing in a foreign language.

Our national sanitary system is in good shape BUT we don't have the economic power to do things like China made, like building hospitals in two weeks. This is the reason why Italy is "locked up". The Lombardia region is very close to the collapse. I will live in my home for the next month, I will work at home, I will go out only to buy food. I am thinking about go running at sunrise, not too meet people.

If a lot of people get the disease there is no structure that can treat them. 5%, 10% of people affected requires "intensive therapy", if the disease will spread 10% of the affected people will die. This happened in Wuhan when the disease begin to spread.

Today in Italy the person in charge of the civil protection gave the numbers of the covid death. 827 deaths, 78% are people with bad pre exixtent conditions, in Italy we say, they died WITH the coronavirus. The remaining are the deaths FOR the coronavirus, the index of letality adjusted according to this consideration is 1.46% and it is compliant with the rest of the world. I want to remark this because I saw your posts about the high mortality of the disease in Italy. We count every death, there are no reserved information (I hope), but I want to remark this important difference. And I repeat, the problem is not the letality, it is the HUGE number of people that require special cares in hospitals.